Whoa, I'm behind! Here's the whirlwind update

I'm not even going to use a text editor.

I got more and more pregnant from Jan-April. My PhD advisor finally OK-ed the final version of a manuscript I was working on, and we submitted it. I tried to submit it, but was having trouble with vmware on my mac, so my advisor submitted it. Wonderful thing for him to do. It was the last chapter of my dissertation, by the way, so I've almost fulfilled my obligation to publish all my research! I still want to help write up some interesting greenhouse work done by our postdoc, but I don't know when that's gonna happen. Sigh.

Our baby girl was born April 11, scheduled c-section. We couldn't think of a name for her! We were thinking Anika, but we didn't quite feel right about it. We wanted a musical name. Q's mom came to visit the first week of April, and suggested the name of Q's dad's favorite raag/raga http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Ms3wV8bhZ6M. Awesome! Thanks, Q's mom :). From now on her blog nickname is CH, for various obscure reasons.

She was born a healthy happy adorable baby. She's almost 2mo old now, and is doing well. Breastfeeding is hard at times, but I figure I only have to make it to 4mo. If I make it further than that, yay me!

Meanwhile, I have to finish revising an encyclopedia chapter on gametic disequilibrium for an encyclopedia. Yikes. And I've been trying to be touristy for Q's mom. We've done the aquarium, a Hindu temple (it was closed...), various dollar stores, beaches (brr), a BigBus tour of Vancouver courtesy of some friends (thanks!), the planetarium, an aboriginal village in Stanley Park, Q took her to Walmart in Burnaby, and up to Mount Seymour to see the snow. I want to take a ferry across the bay, but that depends on weather and on my visiting teaching and on Q's work schedule. Ack.

Luckily, CH is a sweet baby. She gives me a couple 3-hour stretches every night, and sometimes a 4-hr stretch! Amazing. She hardly complains, and adores her older sister TM. TM loves her back. We do have some trouble with bedtimes, and I'm not sure how we'll handle it once Q's mom goes back to India next week, but.

The crib is in the garage somewhere.

The cat is NOT to be trusted around the baby, especially when it's rainy and the cat's antsy.

The baby rocker is also in the garage somewhere.

My bike seat is also in the garage somewhere. I have the rest...

I'll probably give Q the car for work, and I'll just walk TM to preschool (30min) with the stroller instead of getting a bike trailer. I think CH is still a little too young for the trailer. So walking is the goal.

Everyone's complaining about the rainy rainy rainy spring. I'm sorry everyone else has to suffer, but I really appreciate the weather. It's rather heavenly for me. I consider it a personal blessing :). My British Isles ancestry must be coming on strong lately.

We had friends over last night and all were up too late. CH is sleeping right now, and so should I be. I hope I don't pay too much for updating my blog! But come on, four months hiatus is almost unforgivable.

Winter, Christmas, and the to-do list

Winter has set in, and we're even getting some snow. All the leaves are gone from the trees, so my plant/animal ID hobby is going to wait until spring comes back. Maybe next year I'll work on winter twig ID, but for now I'm giving the whole thing a bit of a rest. My blood seems to be quite thin! It hardly gets below freezing here, but I get awfully cold. I remember walking to school in 7th grade in snow up to my knees, and running hither and yon with just a jacket, scarf and mittens. My time in India must have thinned my blood, because it's coooold. No dashing outside to make snowmen with just a simple jacket for me, no way. Brrrr.

The December holidays were lots of fun. We did absolutely nothing. TM got sick and we stayed home. It was great. She loved decorating (and re-decorating) the Christmas tree. We were so backwards this Christmas that I even had to get her to help me wrap presents, including her own. She enjoyed the whole thing, though, so I don't feel too bad. Just don't tell my little sister, whose worst Christmas was when Mom and I decided against a Christmas tree in favor of the dead elm that had just fallen on our property… I have the feeling she'd feel similarly horrified at the idea of a 4-yr old wrapping her own presents… Oh yeah, I forgot -- we also ran out of wrapping paper, and lazy me, we used scraps of fabric to wrap the rest of the presents. Hee hee hee. It worked out well, though -- they looked fine! And we had a lot of fun opening everything on Christmas morning.

TM is turning out to be quite the nurse. The other day, I scraped my leg (there wasn't any blood or anything) and TM came over with a damp washcloth and dabbed at it for me. What a sweety-pie! I feel guilty that I'm not more attentive to her many, many bumps and scrapes. Maybe she'll be a nurse… at least she'd probably always have a job, if the job market continues the way it is now. How silly of me to be thinking about future jobs for her when she's not even in kindergarten yet! One of the perils of having an only child.

Q actually took a vacation during Christmas and New Years, which was a pleasant surprise. We got to hang out with him at home. Usually he gets dragged into work unless we escape somewhere far from work, but this year worked out well. Hooray! But now the new year has started, and my to-do list is growing.

I absolutely have to finish editing the last chapter of my dissertation for submission to a journal before the new baby comes in April. I also have to get a couple more interviews with people for the newspaper article I want to write about green roofs. I've never written a newspaper article before, but it's something I've always wanted to do, so hey! Why not give it a shot? I also have to get TM caught up on her immunizations, and registered for kindergarten. I think that's about it for now. Eventually I'll have to dive into the boxes stacked in the garage to find our crib, and get on craigslist again to buy some newborn clothes, but I'm leaving that 'till later.